Michael,
No fire yet, but it gets very much like an EZ-bake oven. You plan your work for early morning when the Sun is low and to the East. The dish faces slightly West of South, and at an angle about 60 degrees. That one has no motor drive and is a bugger to move / tune. I really need to peak the signal again, get out the big wrenches and a hand sledge!
Im not sure it was drugs after watching the pliers video that Dave and Brian posted. Having a good rebuildable rachet is nice. I have broken a few that weren’t fixable or they don’t have enough teeth and you have to move the handle too far to get it to click and you don’t have enough space.
I like that guy. He comes up with decent tests, but that is it. The snap-on may not have finished #1 in all the tests, but they were near the top especially for the failure ft pound test. I mean one broken rachet in a shop environment that costs 2-3 hours in time is all that it takes to make up the difference in price over the lifetime of the tool.
In a home environment, the cost differential isn’t made up nearly as quickly or at all.
He buys everything he tests. I also watch Den of Tools but he is mostly a shopper and does get stuff sent to him by manufacturers. A lot of the stuff project farm guy buys doesn’t get destroyed. I wonder what he does with all of it. I wonder why I wasn’t smart enough to get into something like these videos and make a bunch of bucks and have people send me stuff to review. I was pretty late getting involved with the internet at all,
There are a bunch of youtube videos out there that don’t get many views or likes. The successful ones are very good presentations. Have you ever tried to sell encyclopedias or vacuum cleaners door to door? Something like that is what you have to be.
Rindert
“Not the work, not the work. The presentation!”
Wrong video Rindert? But it is all about selling sand in the Sahara.
Ha! Ha! I am not going to put up pictured of my various types and brands of 1/4" and 3/8" drive hand ratchets.
Each had to prove the need, and nessecity for me in the tight, tight underhood modern cars, SUV’s and mini-vans.
That pivoting head fine toothed Snap-On in the Project Farm picture is just dandy in a 1/4" drive. My #1 go-to. Near worthless in the 3/8" version. The bigger head and surrounding yoke almost always restrict access and movements.
The flexing, bent-handle, tear-drop heads, speed ratchets in 3/8" get the most usage from me and other Pro mechanics. Fixed handles types just seem clumsy restrictive once you learned bent handled true usability. Originally only a SnapOn thing. Then decades later released in Craftsman. I have both. Get the Craftsman.
Let me sidetrack to another Pro-shop needs.
Footwear. Boots. In the commercial shops the floors are generally smooth and kept clean, clean to not transfer muck up customers interior carpeting. Just work on motorhomes to experience this!!
O.K. rain drippy off of vehicles . . . under chassis and wheelwells snow and ice melting . . . then add a splash; a dripped puddle of transmission fluid, diesel fuel or brake fluid and you will go slip-sliding skating. Real injuries do occur. Broken fingers, broken tail bones and such.
Back in 1999 when I re-entered automotive I was slipping and sliding in my Sear Diehard service shoes. I watched those who were not slip-skating. “Watcha’ wearing?” Redwings with their SuperSole. A single density molded on urethane. Models #952 and #953 are what I used then on. Actually claimed to be able to be sent back and resoled. Ha! Never me. I’d wear holes into the leather toe caps every six to nine months down on my knees and toes points.
Redwings are only sold in Redwing stores. $$$.
Later Australian Redback automotive shoes and boots seemed to also do snot slick shop floors superior too. Sold off of the tool trucks, for tool truck prices. Like the Redwing SuperSole 2.0 types, a shallow lugged dual density sole. Not for me, thank you. One grease glob un-noticed stepped-in could really ruin your day with customers and the management. I did buy a Redback no-scratchEm’ belt I still use to this day. Great, great, leather.
Yeah. Yeah. I know many who use sports shoes of diffnert brands claiming better comfort and just as good. Yeah. Right. I’d speed out walk them in and out of the shop in all weather conditions then with just a mat swipe, swipe right up into the carpeted showroom. Smooth soles on those original SuperSoles. And I was observed to never leave grease tracks. I was given more work, period.
Every industry has its best use footwear. Foundry, electronics manufacturing, chemical plants to trench work. Find what the real line producers use, and then you too use that. Regardless of the costs. Safety and productivity first and foremost.
Steve Unruh
Craftman ratchets used to be good back in the70’s ,after that they nothing but JUNK ratchets- I got 3 or 4 i need to trade in- the problem is though i might have to take them all back in a few weeks- they just dont hold up any more.I AGREE.
I found out a few years ago if you bring in a old ratchet they will try to replace it with a newer style one, and if you throw just enough of a conniption fit in front of other customers about wanting your old ratchet fixed instead of a replacement chinesium garbage they now carry, they will order replacement parts so you can fix it yourself
No matter how old it is. This one was my grandpas so easily from the 50’s. It has new gears now. I have not used it since I found it in a old toolbox of my dads where he said it had been the last 20 or so years
Thanks Rindert, but they doing not list the smooth soled SuperSole #953.
Here:
WORK → Mens → workbooks → 19th row scrolled down. $224.99 available “In-Store Only” Not direct purchase.
Their #1159 slip on Wellington style have the same smooth sole. $234.99
Unless shop policy specified; do not get steeled toed, or waterproof, for all year around use wearing. I’d use four different weight thicknesses of Marino-wool socks to adjust for time of year. Changed out as needed at lunchtime for sweating and rain puddle/snow wetting through.
S.U.
Apparently stanley did a reorganization in 2022 and canceled their Fort Worth plant after they built it. So no craftsman hand tools are USA made. They do have like 20 other sites that do assembly for things. But if I have to buy cheap chinese crap, I will go to harbor freight. The pittsburgh professional line of impact sockets has held up well, and seem precise enough. I don’t trust their rachets.
This is a link to their site closing.
I have beat the dog snot out of the harbor freight ratchets for a few years now, the 1/4 and 3/8 drives have been outstanding. The half inch not so much I have broke a few of those. But in their defense I have broken nearly every 1/2 drive ratchet I have ever owned. Craftsman, Harbor Freight, Mac, Snap-On, Cornwell, Matco, Stanley, Kobalt, actually I have one I have not broken yet and its a titan brand off set head. I am not nice to tools on the side of a busy highway with a broken truck, my tools get dealt abuse on a scale they do not deserve much worse then most any other tool user would do to be honest. I have also had pretty good luck with atd as well
The key is you need the ‘professional’ version of the pittsburgh tools. Then you are out of the bottom end of the price range as well.
I might need a new socket set just so I can read the markings on them or put some braille tags on them.
that is one gripe i have with the harbor freight sockets the etching on them is pretty crappy, it wears off quickly
Klompen (Dutch wooden shoes) are the best thing if you ever have to stand on cold concrete for a long time. Just don’t try to drive a car in them.
Rindert
This is what I am mainly using right now. It was gifted to me. I am not a big fan of how the handle of the ratchet feels in my hand but I love the sockets. with the square part of them they don’t roll off anything and the etching is the easiest to read of any I own.
Ok here is a trick I have never seen that will help any gasifier builder. And I JUST tossed a broken tape last week